


lost and found

by lunardistance



Series: SH 30 Day Fic Meme [2]
Category: Sound Horizon
Genre: Alternate Universe - Pirate, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-15
Updated: 2017-05-15
Packaged: 2018-11-01 04:06:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,076
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10913988
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lunardistance/pseuds/lunardistance
Summary: Strange. In the dim light, he seems no more fearsome than her father. The men that had raided her town are much more terrifying in her eyes.(day 2: write a short fanfiction set in a historical alternate-universe.)





	lost and found

Her feet stumble over yet another rock, eliciting a loud hiss of pain from her, but she does not dare to stop. She wishes she had thought to put on something more sensible than the soft moccasin slippers she had been wearing inside their home, but the raid had begun far too quickly for her to think clearly.

At the first signs of trouble, her father had barred the doors of their house and urged her and her mother into the small hideaway beneath their home, but this time, the marauders had guns. Even the sturdiest wooden bar cannot hope to hold up against gunfire. She and her mother had been dragged out of the hideaway; even now, she can see the intruders’ horrid grins, feel their leers crawl over her body.

All of a sudden, her father had thrown a punch at one of the men holding him back, and her mother had dug her elbow into the gut of the one holding their arms. Her parents had screamed at her to flee, and although she could not bear leaving them that way, her father beaten to within an inch of his life while her mother was slapped by the man she had attacked, she knew she had no choice but to run.

But where can she possibly go now? Her hometown is being looted and pillaged, houses and buildings she has known all her life going up in flames, people she has grown up alongside with—

She swipes her hand over her face. Now is not the time to cry. _Escape, flee while you can, there’s a good girl. There’s my beautiful daughter._

Her feet carry her to the outskirts of the village, all the way to the rocky outcrop overlooking the ocean. This has always been one of her favorite places, and she has many fond memories of rushing up here as a child to wait for her father’s fishing ship to return from sea. Now, the moon and the stars can only shine on the dark surface of the ocean, deceptively calm and detached from the devastation of her hometown. She finally collapses here, exhausted and shivering.

“Now, what is a girl like you doing all the way out here in the middle of the night?”

Her head shoots up immediately, and she whirls around, frantically seeking out the source of the noise. Her hand gropes blindly for a weapon—a stick, a rock, anything she can use to defend herself with—oh, how her parents would weep if she met her end here when they had sacrificed themselves to protect her—

“Calm down. I am in no position to harm you.”

The voice is tinged with amusement, causing a brief flare of irritation within her, but she settles down enough to spot the man bent over at the stocks, watching her with blatant curiosity.

Ah, yes. The pirate captain the townspeople had captured the day prior. Apparently he has some sort of fearsome reputation of looting towns by the hundreds and murdering men by the thousands without a shred of regret. How the townspeople had managed to capture such a terrifying man, she had not been able to catch wind of, but they had placed him on the stocks overlooking the ocean to be picked up by the army when they passed by.

Strange. In the dim light, he seems no more fearsome than her father. The men raiding her town are much more terrifying in her eyes.

A thought occurs to her, and she shrinks back from him warily. “Are those men yours? The ones that have come to tear apart my village? Have they come for their master?”

The man gives a chuckle, a strange one that sends something crawling down her spine. “My men have long been taken by the sea. But your village is being pillaged, you say? How curious that a slip of a girl like you should escape it.”

Her lip quivers at the memory of her parents’ faces as she fled the village, but she does not say a word as she moves towards the stocks, searching for a large rock on the ground. He watches her with unabashed interest as she finally uncovers one suited for her intended purposes; she picks the rock up, and with a great swing to the lock holding the stocks together, manages to break it off.

The man stands up immediately, cricking his neck and rubbing at the cuffs of his wrists where he had been bound. At his full height, she can see why he is considered such a fearsome pirate – he towers at least two heads above her, with flaming red hair and scarlet eyes that seem to peer into her very soul. Her hands tremble as she sets the rock back down, clasping together nervously while he regards her from head to toe.

“Why did you free me?” he murmurs.

“Pirate captain or not, even those men will not leave you be. My town will be nothing but stone and rubble by the morning. No one will be able to benefit from your capture anymore.”

In a few great strides, he comes to stand before her. It is not until he cups her face in his hand and sweeps a thumb over her cheek that she realizes she is crying again.

“What is your name, girl?” he breathes.

“Layla,” she answers in a hushed whisper. “And… they call you the Scarlet Demon.”

“A reputation I thought to be lost at sea forever with my men and my ship,” he acknowledges. “But if you must, call me Shaytan.”

“Shaytan,” she echoes faintly.

“What is it that you desire, Layla?” he asks of her, tilting her head up to better capture her gaze.

“I—” her mind thinks of her town, her parents, the men that had torn her world apart in a single night, “I do not know.”

He makes a deep noise at the back of his throat, a rumble that sounds like the beginning of a storm. “Everything you have loved has slipped from your hands. Now, we are one and the same. Come with me, and I will destroy all that you hate.”

Against the chill of the night, his hand cupping her face feels like burning fire (the same one she can see ravaging her town now—destruction begets destruction, a never-ending chain of hatred—), and she takes it within hers. “I will.”


End file.
